"We must both go, much as it bores us. For myself, I hate sight-seeing at any time, and more especially the re-visitation of things one has seen in one's early youth. Yachting is delightful, and I love it. But the enthusiasm of one's friends when they get ashore is always apt to become tiresome. No, my dear Carmela, we're in for a day of self-sacrifice to-morrow."
I sighed. For myself, I would have preferred to remain in Leghorn, for to me Pisa always seems like a marble-built city of the dead. A single visit there in the course of a life-time is sufficient for most people, and the modern tourist, en route for Rome, generally "does" the sights in a couple of hours, and is glad to get away to the Eternal City. For the archæologist there is much of interest, but we women of the world are neither dry-as-dust professors nor ten-days-in-Italy tourists, and care nothing for the treasuries of its Archivio di Stato, the traditions connected with the miracle-working and carefully-veiled "Madonna sotto gli Organi," the tattered banners of the Knights of St. Stephen, or why the Messa dei Cacciatori was instituted. To me, as to most people who have once set foot in Pisa, its mediæval glories are mouldy.
When Ulrica had left me, I stood before the small mirror of my tiny, white-enamelled cabin, gazing blankly at my own reflection. Why had Ernest forsaken me in favour of that tow-haired, doll-like person, whose parentage no one knew, and whose manners, as far as I had been able to observe them, savoured more of Kennington than Kensington? I was good-looking, still young, still attractive, still sufficiently alluring to cause men to turn and glance after me. That candid friend, my mirror, told me so each time I sought its opinion. And yet I who loved him with all my soul was abandoned!
The queer old man's injunctions recurred to me. It was necessary that I should investigate what was contained in that locked deck-house over my head. But how?
Gerald had told us that the place contained curiosities purchased in Tangier, an explanation evidently given by his father. That this was not the truth I was already aware. Yet if the body of the mysterious female passenger was still there, it was remarkable that the Customs officers had not found it. Still, the men of the Italian dogana are easily bribed. They get half the fines imposed upon contraband, a fact which makes them very eager to discover dutiable articles—and nearly everything is liable to taxation in Italy—but a sly douceur is to them always preferable to the labour entailed in searching a ship and finding nothing to reward them. Davis, the bluff, red-faced captain, or one of his officers, being well aware of this, might, for aught I knew, have judiciously dispensed a few paper lire.
Though old Branca had given his opinion that there was no longer any danger of the dastardly plot being carried into effect, I was not at all convinced of the safety of the vessel. Thus, without removing my hat, I sat on the edge of my narrow little berth for a long time, thinking. We were to sail for the Adriatic. That in itself was suspicious; for why should we retrace our course down the Italian coast again, when the intention had been to make for Marseilles? Keppel had some strong and secret motive for so suddenly altering our plans.
The pumping in the engine-room had been succeeded by the low whirr of the dynamo. At that hour all on board were asleep; for lying as we were off the Mole, there was no necessity for a night-watch to be kept; therefore I decided to venture back on deck, ostensibly to take the air and admire the clearness of the magnificent Italian night, but really to take observations of the locked deck-house.
Stealthily, on tiptoe, I crept out of my cabin, and up the stairs on to the deck. The night was brilliant—one of those which the dweller on the Mediterranean shore knows so well in spring, calm, balmy, starlit, with the crescent moon shedding its light over the distant range of mountains far inland. The lights of the harbour were reflected by the dark, unsteady waters; and from the ancient lighthouse shone the bright rays of warning far across old Neptune's highway.
As I emerged on deck, before me extended the long line of electric lamps along the Passeggio to Ardenza, and behind me lay the brightly-lit City of Leghorn, complex and mysterious. From across the port came the sound of steam winches, interspersed now and then with the low rumbling of coal being shot into barges—the produce of Cardiff and Newcastle, disembarked by some "tramp" eager for departure; and once there came from over the water the hoarse note of a steam siren announcing a vessel's immediate sailing.
I lingered for a moment, affecting to enjoy the night air, but really to disarm the suspicion of anyone who might be astir. All on board was quiet, however, and the silence reassured me. I crept forward to the deck-house, passing its closed and curtained port-holes.